


the winds of change are blowing wild and free

by r1ker



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: M/M, leave me to die
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-29
Updated: 2016-11-29
Packaged: 2018-09-03 01:36:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8691397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/r1ker/pseuds/r1ker
Summary: can't believe this show ended at 3x05!





	

**Author's Note:**

> can't believe this show ended at 3x05!

Ed walks into the mayor's office once again but with a different edge to his step. Instead of easing into the room with a mission in mind as is (was) his duties as chief of staff, he lingers at the doorway. In the grand leather chair behind an equally as immense oak desk sits his (former) boss, the mayor, and, arguably, one of the only people that's ever been in love with him.

 

"If you've come here to beg for your job back," Oswald murmurs through a hand resting on his exhausted face. "I won't be needing you. I've had a staffer round me up equally as hard-working candidates that I'll be seeing to after the weekend." Ed still tries to hang on to the spot of malice his heart retains for Isabella's fate, but the sound of Oswald's voice, the way his body depends on that chair for any kind of support, weakens his defenses. On the heel of his foot Oswald slowly brings the chair about so that he and Ed are now looking at one another.

 

For a few seconds they can only look at each other in the efforts to find something to say worth uttering. Oswald's stare is intense, unlike any Ed's ever had the privilege of seeing come across his stoic face in all the time they've known each other, that after only a minute of maintaining focus tears gather at the waterlines of his eyes. "Just know I loved you with all of me. Not that there was a lot to give to love after having every single thing in my life I cared about ripped away from me in only a matter of years, but it was enough. More than I had ever reserved for myself, in all the days I've lived."

 

Looking down into his lap the shift in his face causes those tears to fall, not having the time to slip down his face. "She did not love you, Ed. And I've had the suspicion you didn't love her, either." Ed opens his mouth to immediately rebut that with what he's had on repeat, said by rote to anyone who's questioned his devotion to her, but is stopped by Oswald's hand rising slowly into the air. "I don't want to hear it, not anymore. I don't have the time to sit here and listen to you go on and on about a woman you loved for two weeks. I don't have it in me anymore."

 

The back of Ed's throat tenses as Oswald poises himself in his chair to say more, the sorrow bleeding away into something surprisingly bitter. "If what you're wanting to hear is that I killed her, then from this point forward, want no more. I did it, and before you ask, yes, I still go to sleep at night; I still get up in the morning and hope that it was a wake-up call for you. And as it seems now, you're still asleep."

 

Oswald swallows in the way Ed wants so desperately to so that he may relieve it of its persistent ache. "And in a way, so am I. I'm in a dream world where you love me, and I you. You are asleep next to me in a way opposite of mine, wishing for all the world something doesn't bring you out of the place where she is with you once again, and you two relive the hapless romance you and Kristen once shared. I come out of it long enough to see you two rejoicing in whatever it is two people star struck with instantaneous, meaningless love have to celebrate. In a matter of seconds I'm back in my own world again, where I am her."

 

Ed takes a few steps closer to the desk as Oswald pauses just long enough to articulate his final thought. "I hope to God I don't wake up, either." With that he turns back to the desk and its mounds of papers needing sifting through. Ed watches the tears dry up, turn into nothing but a persistent throat clearing as he gazes into the crackling fire nearby in search of something to present as his side of the case. It's when Oswald stands up to lazily stoke the embers does Ed make his first and only move of the night.

 

His hand holds Oswald's on the wrist, where the hand is gripping a wrought iron poker. The pressure of Ed's hand causes Oswald to turn just enough for Ed to put one hand on his jaw. For a reason he'll never figure out himself, his head shakes once just before he leans in to kiss Oswald. It's a little awkward given the angle, and the frigid way Oswald stops in his tracks to give himself over unwilling to the gesture. Even after precious seconds have passed Oswald has yet to recognize all that is happening.

 

So Ed steps closer, makes sure his feet are between Oswald's to match the hand on the small of his back. He breaks the kiss to gather Oswald closer to him in a more sincere way then was their last embrace, in the throes of bitter betrayal. Like he's done so many times before Oswald finally gives in to the temptation, hugs Ed as tightly as is being done to him. Ed won't forget the sorrowful exhale Oswald breathes into the weave of Ed's jacket, the arms around his neck, or the smooth cheek brushing against his jaw. He won't ever forget Kristen, or the impostor that once was, but he especially won't let this night, or any other night he and Oswald shared with unknown, unrequited love, go unnoticed.


End file.
